Demon King of the Royal Class-Chapter 589

The stairway leading underground wasn’t very long.

As Ellen descended through the trapdoor which had been buried in debris, the stench of decay and the nauseating smell of blood grew stronger with each step.

“What on earth... What could possibly be down here?” she murmured, her voice tense.

Ellen pushed open the door to the temple’s basement, and found herself in pitch-black darkness. She summoned the cloak of the sun, which draped itself over her shoulders, and soon, the flickering flames from the cloak began to push back the shadows.

As the darkness receded, a long corridor emerged, lined with rooms.

The basement had been spared from the fire above, but bodies lay strewn about, either undiscovered or ignored.

“There are bodies here too...”

Ludwig, his eyes wide with shock, stared blankly at the scene.

There was a hidden place beneath the temple, a place that served a grim purpose. The stench that rose to the surface was the smell of blood and decay.

“It seems like killing the people in here was the attackers’ original goal,” Ellen said, her voice steady despite the horror around her.

Unlike Ludwig, who had been overwhelmed by the scene, Ellen moved calmly down the corridor.

What did this temple and the dead people signify?

‘This seems to have been the true purpose of this place all along...’ she thought.

There weren’t too many bodies, but it was still a considerable number.

Ellen continued down the corridor, peering into the rooms. There was a space that looked like a dining room, a storage area, and even bedrooms.

‘The temple above was just a facade; the reality lay underground. More people lived here than I had ever imagined.’

Ellen noticed scattered weapons—swords and spears littered the ground.

‘Not a massacre, but signs of a battle... The attackers and the underground dwellers clashed here,’ she observed.

It was impossible to distinguish attackers from victims, as none wore priestly robes.

More stairs led further down, and the stench grew stronger with each step.

Ludwig wasn’t terrified, but the realization that more people had died and that there was a a sinister purpose behind this temple left him feeling even more bewildered.

They arrived at a second underground floor.

“What... What is this?” Ludwig muttered, dazed.

The second level was even larger than the first.

“A prison... perhaps,” Ellen said softly as she surveyed the vast space.

The space resembled a large-scale detention facility, with iron bars lining the walls. All the prisoners were dead, hanging lifelessly from their restraints.

‘The cause of death is a penetrating wound... stabbed by a weapon like a spear.’

Ellen paced through the detention facility that too up the second underground floor, examining the bodies behind the iron bars.

‘All the other bodies show the same cause of death. They were stabbed from outside the bars, suggesting they were executed. Judging by the scars, they weren’t just confined, but were also tortured. There are several rooms that resemble torture chambers.

She continued to look around.

‘Imprisonment and torture... Did the attackers come here to rescue the prisoners? If that was their goal, then these people weren’t killed by the attackers, but executed by those who were already here in this temple. It’s unclear if rescue was the intention, but they failed to save them.

‘Who are these people, and why were they being held here?’

“Ellen...”

Ludwig’s voice, filled with confusion, broke Ellen’s train of thought.

Ludwig stood frozen in front of the iron bars as he called her name. His gaze was fixed on the lifeless figure inside.

“I... I saw this person yesterday...” he stammered.

“What?” Ellen asked, moving closer to him.

The prisoner had been mysteriously stabbed to death as well, but Ellen didn’t recognize his face.

Ludwig’s eyes were wide with shock.

“Yesterday... Among the people who tried to attack me and the priestess... This person was there. I remember... This person was definitely there...”

“They tried to attack you?” Ellen asked, her voice tinged with concern.

Ludwig nodded, recounting the events of the previous day.

During a mission to purify disease within the refugee camp, they had stumbled into a disturbance involving heretics. Rowen, who had been with him, had lost her composure when she realized they were facing heretical priests.

After the operation, those same priests had attempted to ambush Ludwig and Rowen, forcing them to flee.

Now, one of those attackers lay imprisoned and dead.

“When they were in front of me, they pretended they would leave those people alone...”

“But in reality, they snatched them away from the refugee camp. That’s the situation, I guess,” Ellen said, finishing Ludwig’s sentence.

Ludwig, fueled by anger over Rowen’s death, had turned to Ellen for help. Yet, it was becoming clear that Rowen might not have been the good person he thought she was.

It was uncertain if all those imprisoned shared the same story, but there was a strong chance they were all considered heretics.

Rowen’s demeanor, which seemed to unravel at the mere sight of heretics, was telling.

The torture chambers... Ludwig was beginning to understand the true nature of this place and who Rowen really was.

“Could it be... This place... and the priestess...” he murmured, his voice trailing off.

Ellen, who had been quietly examining the prison, spoke, her words cutting through the silence.

“They were most likely inquisitors.”

Ludwig remained silent.

This was undoubtedly a place where heretics had been interrogated, tortured, and reformed.

If that was the case, it was right to assume that Archbishop Rowen was the leader of the inquisitors.

Ludwig’s eyes were wide with a mix of betrayal and defeat.

It seemed almost certain now that Archbishop Rowen, under the guise of purifying diseases, was capturing and torturing heretics from the refugee camp.

Ellen, though shaken by the revelation, pressed on with her exploration of the underground prison.

It wasn’t just a place of detention and torture. As she examined the lifeless bodies, she noticed their emaciated forms. They were all refugees, brutally tortured for their beliefs.

‘This means the ones who attacked this place were able to overwhelm the defenders, even though they had the power to conduct an inquisition and the strength to defend this place... Someone capable of Mana Reinforcement must have been involved.’

Attacking the inquisitors’ base was no small feat. These weren’t just ordinary rebels; they were a formidable group.

‘They came to rescue people, but the people were silenced instead. And the fact that the entrance to this underground area was blocked by debris... It’s still unclear who did that.’

Whether their goal was rescue or something else, the attackers stormed the inquisitors’ base, killed everyone inside, and then disappeared.

‘In any case, the entrance had probably been blocked off before the guards or looters arrived.’

A fire had broken out, prompting the guards’ arrival. The fact that they did not discover this underground space suggested the entrance had already been blocked off.

Then, the holy knights had arrived and taken over before anyone could discover this place.

‘They tried to keep me out, hoping I wouldn’t stumble upon what was going on here...’

Capturing, torturing, and killing civilians, even in the name of a religious inquisition, was something that could spiral out of control if it came to Ellen’s attention.

However, the holy knights, unable to stop Ellen, had reluctantly stepped aside.

Drawing their swords against Ellen, the Church’s symbol, in order to protect the secrets of the Church was absurd.

Ellen moved through the detention and torture rooms, heading to the chamber at the far end.

“Ellen...”

“Yes, I’m listening.”

“If they’re inquisitors... they’re like the holy knights, right? They’d have to fight if needed.”

“I’m not entirely sure, but probably.”

While it wasn’t always necessary, inquisitors probably still needed practical combat skills in case the heretics they pursued wielded dangerous powers.

“Then... Rowen must have been someone important among the inquisitors.”

“Probably.”

“Wouldn’t that mean Rowen could actually fight?”

As the leader of the inquisitors, she probably had practical combat skills, though that was not a certainty. The popes of the different Orders, for instance, might possess immense Divine Power, but might not necessarily have to be chosen from the ranks of holy knights.

“That might be the case. After all, Rowen was performing duties in the field. She was probably skilled.”

Rowen seemed like the hands-on type, so she would have been adept in combat, perhaps even more so than Ludwig.

“Then... Why did she need protection?”

“Hmm... That’s a good point.”

Ludwig felt a wave of confusion, and Ellen had to admit his question was valid.

“If she were an inquisitor, she should have been able to fight. And if she was gathering information or spying on heretics in the refugee camp, she wouldn’t need guards. Moving through the camp by herself would have been more discreet. It doesn’t add up.”

“Why... Why didn’t she do that, then?”

“I don’t know. Not yet.”

It was certainly puzzling. While it was possible Rowen lacked combat abilities, it seemed unlikely for the leader of the inquisitors, someone actively involved in fieldwork, to be without such skills.

If Rowen had enough power to protect herself, why had she requested for a security detail while going around the refugee camp?

Ellen made her way through the prison and eventually reached a room at the end of another corridor. As she opened the door, she saw a desk, a chair, and a bookshelf inside.

“This must be Rowen’s personal office... or something,” she murmured.

The room clearly belonged to someone in charge. The bookshelf was crammed with books on the holy war and theology.

Ellen walked over to the table.

Scattered across it were several documents, most of them written in some sort of cipher which was impossible for Ellen to decipher.

It made sense for the documents to be encrypted, given their sensitive nature.

But then, Ellen spotted a single document she could understand.

Her heart skipped a beat as she carefully picked up the lone sheet of paper.

“Ellen...? Did you find something?”

Ellen passed the document to Ludwig, and his eyes widened in shock.

They couldn’t decipher the encrypted text, but there was one thing they both recognized immediately.

The photograph on the document...

“Why is my face... here...?”

Ludwig’s picture was right there on the page.

“I can’t read it, but it's definitely a document with your personal information,” Ellen said, piecing together its significance.

Even without understanding the words, she could sense its importance.

“She didn’t need protection,” Ellen remarked, glancing at Ludwig.

“It seems she approached you on purpose.”

Rowen had clearly sought out Ludwig on purpose.

Ellen decided to keep the document.

***

The temple of Ouen, which had already been in decline, hid a dark secret beneath its floors—a place where people were imprisoned and tortured. It was the base of the inquisitors, and now its secret had been exposed.

Most of the inquisitors had been slaughtered by unknown assailants. A fire had erupted, and in the aftermath, looters had pillaged the temple.

The entrance to the underground had been deliberately blocked by debris.

Ludwig was still in shock from the knowledge that Rowen had orchestrated these horrific acts. But the sinister operations underground were over.

Ellen guided the dazed Ludwig back to the surface.

The holy knights stood pale and motionless at the entrance to the underground space, unable to enter or leave under Ellen’s orders. They should have stopped Ellen from seeing anything, but they had not been able to stand in her way.

Ellen wasn’t sure if they were connected to the inquisition, but they clearly knew what sort of place this was, which was why they tried to stop her. They had no excuse if they were to face the warrior’s wrath.

The holy knights, silent and tense, awaited Ellen’s words.

“They mentioned a shortage of priests,” she said.

Ellen neither judged them nor pressed for the truth. They likely didn’t know the full story anyway.

“It seems there were plenty of priests available for killing people,” Ellen remarked casually as she walked past them.